The majority voted in favour of a motion to read this bill for a second time.(Read more about the stages that a bill must pass through to become a law here. ) This means that the majority agree with the main idea of the bill and that they can now discuss it in more detail.

an approval process can be completed when an approval bilateral agreement is suspended, cancelled or ceases to apply to a particular action;

state and territory processes that meet the appropriate standards can be accredited for bilateral agreements;

a relevant bilateral agreement continues to apply to an accredited state or territory management arrangement or authorisation process despite minor amendments to the arrangement or authorisation process; and

proponents do not need to make referrals to the Commonwealth for actions that are covered by an approval bilateral agreement.(Find out more about the bill, including its explanatory memorandum, here.)

The majority voted in favour of an amendment to further protect water resources from coal seam gas development and large coal mining development.

The amendment was introduced by Independent MP Tony Windsor. It gives precedence to the subdivision of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (Cth) that protects water resources from significant impacts caused by coal seam gas development and large coal mining development.(This subdivision is available to read on ComLaw, the Commonwealth website that contains the full text of all recent Australian Government legislation. For more on the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (Cth) see the Wikipedia entry.) This is the case even where bilateral agreements would otherwise allow a state government to act in respect of this type of development without approval.

References

No

No

Passed by a small majority

How
"voted very strongly for"
is worked out

The MP's votes count towards a weighted average where the most important votes get
50 points,
less important votes get
10 points,
and less important votes for which the MP was absent get
2 points.
In important votes the MP gets awarded the full
50 points
for voting the same as the policy,
0 points
for voting against the policy, and
25 points
for not voting. In less important votes, the MP gets
10 points
for voting with the policy,
0 points
for voting against, and
1
(out of 2)
if absent.

Then, the number gets converted to a simple english language phrase based on the range of values it's within.

No of votes

Points

Out of

Most important votes (50 points)

MP voted with policy

0

0

0

MP voted against policy

0

0

0

MP absent

0

0

0

Less important votes (10 points)

MP voted with policy

2

20

20

MP voted against policy

0

0

0

Less important absentees (2 points)

MP absent*

0

0

0

Total:

20

20

*Pressure of other work means MPs or
Senators are not always available to vote – it does not always
indicate they have abstained. Therefore, being absent on a less
important vote makes a disproportionatly small
difference.